REVERIE
by S.J Carter
Summary: Secretly, Klaus thinks that there are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn't true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true. He's not sure which side he's on. He doesn't think that he wants to find out, either ―-KlausHayley


_Le notes:_ hello. Tis me again. Back with more klayley because I need this pairing like I need oxygen. This story is also au after 1x11 (and it disregards the events of tvd100, for obvious reasons). And for those who follow me on tumblr, this is the continuation of that preview I posted. I changed the title and summary (previously titled_: i tell my love to cut off all my ropes and watch me as i fall_)

_Summary__:_ Secretly, Klaus thinks that there are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn't true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true. He's not sure which side he's on. He doesn't think that he wants to find out, either ―-KlausHayley

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**REVERIE**

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"go on, she urged. lie to me by the moonlight. do a fabulous story."  
― F. Scott Fitzgerald, _Gatsby Girls_

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Lies are an inexorable source of false knowledge which spread across the cursed land of New Orleans faster than disease, faster than wild forest-fires. Especially on nights when these lies involve the deceitful little stories about a pretty-eyed boy with lips light rouge, like crushed cranberries. And a girl with explosive, python-like eyes, sweet apricot smiles, and fickle little words, which slip through her lips, like spells casted by some magician. Truths, however, are a rarity in the Mikaelson household. Hayley Marshall learns about this fact very early on. What's worse is that she thinks that quite possibly, she's adapted this feature and, that they've made a liar out of her, as well.

Although, unfortunately, her lies are of a different kind. The kind which involves concealing her horrible nightmares and crying herself to sleep. Except on the night where the death of a young one startles her so much that she finds herself running so fast and so carelessly, that she ends up heading straight for Klaus's bedroom.

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On a late autumn evening, crisp and lush with the feeling of wet green grass between her toes, she feels warm sweat turned cold on her stretched-out skin. Her glowing eyes, like fireflies, stare the night with equal measures of fear and temptations. Girls like her, they like the night. They like listening to dark silence, the way the trees and fences look like black lumps, and hearing the obscure breeze whistling throughout the hours. How the moon doesn't shine as bright as the sun, its ironic beauty, and the sound of the heater coming from across the room.

He spies her from afar, noticing her heavy eyes, dreams ―or nightmares, rather― still hanging on to them as she becomes this insomniac. A girl whose under-eyes are painted black and blue, and he can hear her heart, still aching with yearning.

Yearning for things she wants, things she has yet to want, and things she's too scared of wanting since―

"You're up quite late." He comments, looking oddly attentive and the slightest bit concerned. She shakes her head, blaming herself for looking too much in to it. He might just be curious. He might just be irritated by all the ruckus she is causing. Actually, he feels a tad bit of both emotions. It is only subtly present on his face.

Patiently, he waits for her answer, walking towards her with casual, light footsteps.

She doesn't even flinch, doesn't even offer him a gaze. Her pupils are fixed towards the poetry of the night, as if its pages are an escape. "I can't sleep," she breathlessly says. "A young girl just died right before my eyes and…I'm bringing a young girl in to this world soon. This dangerous and cruel world where death is like, an everyday occurrence. I can't help but think that―"

She does this a lot, he notes, she doesn't know when to stop talking on moments where she's nervous or frightened.

Most of the times, he taunts her for it or, he simply ignores her. Tonight however, he sees the immense amount of fear all over her smoky-eyes, and something deep inside of him triggers awake.

"Davina's death was…" he begins slowly, placing tight hands over the railing of the balcony (almost inching too close to her own hands), "unfortunate yes, but," she meets his eyes, for the first time tonight. "You must believe me when I say that I will not let any harm come to my child."

"I know that." She nods her head, fingers crawling over her swollen belly, all tense and worried eyes peering down at the stretched skin above her waist. "I'm just really shaken up by it, all right? I mean, even if she was an all-powerful witch whenever I saw her…" she stops mid-sentence when a shooting star flies passed the dark skies. She wonders if Klaus sees it too. Although, how can he? When, all this time, he hasn't been able to tear his eyes off of her. "All I saw was a sixteen year old girl," Hayley continues, slowly. "A sixteen year old girl who was still learning about life, who's soul still has some searching to do."

This time, Klaus wonders if she thinks that Davina isn't the only girl here who had her youth stolen away from her, much too soon.

Hayley releases a shaky breath; it's more like a sigh, really. "She didn't even get to finish highschool, or go to college…" She looks down, lashes like moth's wings bat furiously and quickly as she becomes more and more anxious.

Without thought, he reaches his hand out and perhaps, it's a comforting notion. Per chance, these lonely and awful nights have gotten to him, too. Maybe, a young girl's death and Marcel's rejection have also shaken him to a point where he feels the need to feel close to somebody. Anybody.

She feels his fingers inch closer and for a moment, she flinches. Frightened by him, his demeanour, the entity that is Klaus Mikaelson; the hybrid, the mastermind, the monster. The softness of his touch catches her off-guard. He places a few loose strands of her hair behind her ear, fingers lingering on her skin as she brings her eyes up to meet his. Impatiently, she wonders about his next move.

These longing stares could only go on for so long. Still, Niklaus isn't Elijah. The hybrid takes what he can and even more. He ravages and conquers, and he's this insane and wild thing, which is probably what attracted her towards him, in the first place.

Slowly but surely, the silence of the night starts to sound like some old record, stuck on the tune of his heavy breathing mingled with her own.

It's only a matter of time before someone gives in.

(She pushes his hand away with cold silence and unknowingly, his irises also shine with bumble-bee colored patterns and they start buzzing, just as loudly).

Niklaus does not take rejection kindly.

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The truth here is that she remembers him from another time and another place.

It's an old dream, of a sort. She remembers being seventeen and closed-eyed, the night wearing down on her. She remembers falling asleep on the street, on cold asphalt floors with a thin mat, lying down on concrete sidewalks with plaid covers filled with holes. She wasn't cold though, not really, because being a werewolf has all those perks. But she is lonely, incredibly so.

"It's him, isn't it?" The leader of the wolf pack she just recently joined questions her. "That boy you keep seeing in your dreams. You're thinking about him, aren't you?"

Hayley rolls her eyes, finding herself quite predictable.

The wolf girl called Sarah sits even closer towards Hayley now, curious about this strange little phenomenon. "You've never actually told me about his specificities, you know?"

"He's just some dream," Hayley chimes, "no one important. My first priority will always be my search for my family. Not some guy I've never even met."

Now it is Sarah's turn to roll her eyes. "I know." She tells her. "Still, I've just always wanted to know something," in the end, her curiosity always gets to her. "Is he cute?"

Hayley releases a laugh. "You're kidding right?"

"I'm not." Sarah's quite serious, actually. Hayley, however, only shakes her head. So her friend, her pack leader, offers her an interesting bit of information. "You know, there's this old story my grand momma used to tell me when I was little." She claims, sparking a sudden interest in Hayley. Sarah smiles, wildly. "She said that wolves tend to dream of their future mates, even before they get to meet them."

Hayley's eyes widen with surprise. "And you actually believe in that sort of thing?"

"Not particularly." Sarah admits. "But hey, anything's possible."

It's all kinds of weird, Hayley guesses, that some people think that these things never happen, not really. That girls like her don't exist outside of books.

Her eyes are closed now, and there is a blue-eyed boy staring at her from her dreams. She wonders why he looks so sad and lost, just like she does. She wonders why his brushstrokes are always so quick and jaded. But, you know, they say that all sad people paint so she guesses that it must be symbolic, in a poetic sort-of way. She never understood poetry though, not as well as he did.

"_Hello again, little wolf."_

The truth is that, the first time she saw him, she forgot to recognize him.

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"You don't have to do this," she feels the need to remind him, even though he insists that he's not doing_ this_ for her. "I'll be fine, I'm sure I'll be able to fall back asleep. Soon enough."

Klaus is in his study, just across the hall from her bedroom.

He is silent for a moment and she is struck by the eerie feel of déjà vu.

"I've been through worse, you know?" Hayley continues, for lack of a way better explanation. The truth is that she really doesn't want to accept his concern for her. If anything, she's quite unaccustomed to_ this_ side of him. She doesn't think that his kindness flatters her, not in the least.

It actually frightens her.

"Not with my child inside you." He keeps telling her, and it's all he says, for now.

Her eyes hang over the view from her own balcony. It's so different from the one from his bedroom. She can't see the moon from this angle, though its image is reflected in to the watercolors of the sunless swimming pool.

"_Please, _the last thing I want is for this baby to―" She stops talking when she hears footsteps, and she can feel his presence, radiating from across the bedroom. "What?" She breaks the silence between them, quite easily. "What is it?" Hayley nervously questions. "What do you want?"

She sounds scared now. He wonders why that's so.

Once again, he doesn't speak. His fingers only crawl over her shoulder, looking straight in to her eyes. Snakes, he thinks, anaconda-green and scaly and reptile-like. The eyes of a girl who has seen far too much.

Yet, he can't help himself.

"Klaus," she begins, turning her head towards him. "You have to stop doing these weird…I mean you can't just…you can't just…" She doesn't even know. His palm only presses harder against her skin. It's a familiar move he's pulled, many times before. Touching her thin shoulder, feeling the dents of her bones and the prominent mark of her clan. The crescent-moon shaped, light sandalwood colored scar left on her blade. It's his way of _claiming _her, she figures. It must be a weird wolf thing.

"Fright and uncertainty don't quite suit your _charming bravado_," Klaus whispers, "little wolf." Cool blue eyes travel her body, up and down, then from side-to-side. Hayley feels so self-conscious around him. More self-conscious than she's ever felt around anyone before.

"You don't know me Klaus," she finally tells him, eyes locked on the image of his fingers, digging in to her shoulder-blade. "Don't act like you do."

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The truth here is that she always thinks of their first kiss.

Of bubble-gum colored lips and sky blue eyes. The taste of sweet wildberries mixed with the minty flavor of his chapstick. Something so boyish and so unexpected. Still, she hadn't thought that their kiss would feel so lethal. As if she was committing another sin. It's actually not as relieving as she first thought it would be. On the contrary, their kiss causes her even more stress, because it feels extremely good to be able to kiss him. To have the hybrid king whispering her name in a shaky voice. To have his royal head between her thighs. To have his strong hands running weakly down her spine. As if he could belong to her, just for one night.

As if she could pretend that he does.

(In the end, their meeting becomes worrisome because it is simply the beginning of their ever-so complex relationship. This is not the first time that he makes her heart feel like it's doing backflips inside her chest. Consequently, it's not the last time, either).

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The next night, she so rarely does manage to find herself slumbering away. Unfortunately for him, she decides to take refuge in his bed. At first, she really didn't want to. She knows that it would probably anger him. Still, she found herself losing consciousness and, soon enough, she had dozed off and landed in between Niklaus's lavender scented sheets.

(He sits on the edge of the bed, carefully, so he does not wake her. And, for the first time, his hand wanders off on its own, only to place itself softly on top of her swollen belly).

"_Niklaus_," his name falls between her lips as she sleeps, and he wonder if it means something. If she's dreaming about him. If she dared to want him in such a way, which would force her to keep it all a secret. To bottle her feelings up and refuse to face him.

Maybe that's why she's so sleepless.

"Elijah," she whispers again.

(And Klaus removes his hand from her skin, almost too quickly. As if she is a piece of hot coal, or a great ball of fire, and he had just been burned by her reckless flames).

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Secretly, he thinks that he could know her. He really could, if she had just allowed him to do so. He'd know her like he knew the back of his hand. She'd be an open book. Her walls wouldn't be up so high.

Goliath himself would no longer fear tearing them down.

And if he could, maybe he would apologize to her. For breaking the ruby-red shards of her heart (because he knows the pain of heartbreak, all too well). He'd apologize for the struggles he's made her face. That he pretended like she didn't matter when, in reality, she was so-very important.

But he's not _that_ guy; he refuses to be like some white knight. He's never seen her as a damsel in distress anyway. It'd an unfitting role, for the both of them.

(Secretly, Klaus thinks that there are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn't true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true. He's not sure which side he's on. He doesn't think that he wants to find out, either).

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The sheets next to her feel cold, colder than the chilling breath of death, even if he does slumber away, quietly beside her. She doesn't know what got over him. He probably got too tired and besides, this is _his _bed after all. He has perfectly justified claims to it. She's the one who's interfering.

He wakes up before she has a chance to escape his wrath.

He stares at her, sleepy eyes watching her with boy-like features. He's quite strange looking in the morning, she thinks. He's really wolfish, ears twitching and knuckles rubbing against his eyes. Scratching the back of his ear and yawning in to his sleeve. Blonde curls, all messy and untamed. He really did remind her of the boy from her dreams. All childish and innocent. She doesn't know why she's thinking of _that _now though.

"I'm sorry I hogged your bed." She doesn't know why she's apologizing, either. They've shared his bed before, and they _just_ slept so it really shouldn't be a big deal. Only it is, to her anyway.

He fails to offer her his words, which is strange because he's usually chalk full of stories. He only nods his head, simply acknowledging her concerns rather than addressing them with full attention.

"I'll make sure it won't happen again," Hayley tries to comfort him but, once again, Klaus stays silent. "I'll get out of your hair now." She rolls out of his bed, her small feet slip in to her fuzzy black slippers, as she pulls her sweater closer to her skin.

He doesn't watch her leave but he does decide to speak up, finally. "I don't suppose anyone has ever told you about Freud's theory about the _superego_?"

His mention of it is quite suspicious, she has to admit. However, she has genuinely always been interested in his fascinating tales. He is a fascinating man, after all. No woman could deny that. "I can't say that anyone has." She lets him know.

"I thought so," he says, casually. "There's an interesting part of his theory which involves one's dreamstate. According to Freud, the reason one struggles to remember dreams is because the _superego_ protects the conscious mind from disturbing images and desires conjured by the unconscious mind."

And then, just then, she feels her heart sink in to her the very bottom of her stomach.

A malicious smile arises amongst Klaus's features.

"Why don't you just say what you actually mean instead of using Freud as some method of analysis?" She wants to say, but all she manages to say is this: "Why are you telling me this?"

He scoffs a laugh at her foolishness. "You sound frightened. Do you think I'm manipulating you?"

She shrugs. "You could be. It's what you're known for, after all."

"It's not_ all_ I'm known for."

Hayley doesn't smile, even though he could be flirting with her. Or maybe she's misinterpreting all of this. Then again, maybe she's not. "I don't know anything about Freud. Or art. Or literature. Or all these things you seem to love talking about."

"I suppose I could enlighten you."

"I don't need that," she finally tells him, refusing to change for some man (thought he isn't just some man now, is he? He's the father of her child, which makes him quite an important man, since he's willing to look after her). "I don't need anybody Klaus. I have been on my own for a long _long _time."

He sighs, heavily. "We all have our weaknesses love; even I give in to my loneliness, at some point."

"I'm not comparing myself to you," she adds, "I would never do that."

"Why?" He questions, with a genuine sense of curiosity. "Because you think I'm some evil, fiendish, horrific monster? Someone you could never relate to?" All the while, he smiles with those words. He doesn't take them as insults, not really. He mostly revels in the matter. He can't that they're not flattering.

Unexpectedly, she shakes her head. "No," she says. "That's not what I think at all." He then realizes that she was right the first time. He doesn't know her at all. She's nothing like the other girls. She's unlike anyone he's ever met, in his centuries of existence.

"Monsters are these scary, creepy, crawly things. And you're just…" Light-filled eyes and boyish smiles, porcelain skin and shiny white teeth. The overwhelming scent of cologne and old books. Everything and anything.

(She meets his eyes and she realizes that she sees her own reflection within his pupils. Unintentionally, she hates herself, just a little bit more).

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There's a story in here, somewhere. A story about a man who plagued her dreams and a young woman who loved to be frightened. It's quite a sad story, she figures, one she'll probably never tell anyone.

_I could never hate you, _she should have told him, _never pity you, you should know that._

Maybe he does know.

_I don't care_, it's how he'd probably reply to her, _I don't, Idon't, idont, i_―

(The truth here is that he does care, she's sure because once upon a time, he had told her that she was beautiful and he breathed the words against her neck. In return, she had sent him a girlish giggle and fallen back asleep, next to him. It was a perfect day, with the world beneath her eyelids exploding with color. And she let herself believe he couldn't mean anything more to her than a simple one night stand).

She was so_ young_ when she first met him, she realizes. So young, so foolish, and so very naïve.

_I wish I never knew you, _she'd like to tell him, someday.

But, then again, all he'd do is respond with a smug _don't be ridiculous love._

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And in the night, someone wakes up, screaming.

_I do care. _

_I do, _

_I DO, _

_**I DO**_―

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**End**

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_Le more notes: _(crawls in to a hole) why me so bad at endings? I was trying to express something about lying to yourself and the consequences of it. And then this story just got out of hand (because I was reading up on Freud, and dreams, and all these strange things that universities like to teach you). Will you review anyway? Pwetty pwease with sugar on top?

―**_Xoxo Carter_**


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